The white and waxy cave. Jacob stands small in the corner, surrounded by still air and fluctuating stone walls, which might be part of a potemkin village constructed by US Park Service Rangers and left intact for him to accidentally discover. Or perhaps he has stumbled up the staircase to heaven and, stopping halfway up to take off his hat, gotten lost on the landing, as the sound of the party fades away and the artichoke paste he had in his mouth an hour before, now sour and poisonous in his mouth, at first taste (a month has passed, so suddenly).